


Cupcake

by Sholio



Category: White Collar
Genre: Fluff and Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-09
Updated: 2013-01-09
Packaged: 2017-11-24 06:03:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 464
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/631242
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sholio/pseuds/Sholio
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first of my ficlets for fandom_stocking (which I will be reposting here over the next couple of days). Peter gives Neal a little present.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cupcake

There are days, working for the FBI, when Neal doesn't think it will ever end. Days when he feels so trapped he could scream, when the bars of the cage around him are so close he can touch them, when the anklet feels like a thousand-pound anchor dragging him down.

And then Peter does something like ... put a cupcake on his desk.

"What's this?" Neal asks, looking up, startled.

"It's a cupcake," Peter says, deadpan. "And that's why they pay me the big detective bucks."

It's chocolate, with candy sprinkles on top, in a little paper muffin cup, shiny with grease. Neal picks it up and turns it around.

"Why are you giving me a cupcake?" It's not his birthday, or any other occasion that Neal can think of.

"I don't know. There was a guy selling them from a cart on the sidewalk. And," Peter says, "you looked like you needed a cupcake."

He brushes his fingers over Neal's, the tiniest of touches, the only thing that they dare allow themselves at work, under the watchful eyes of the world. And then he goes up to his office.

Neal can still feel the touch of Peter's fingers on his, the warmth of Peter's brown eyes, just a few shades lighter than the chocolate frosting on the cupcake.

He sets it very carefully on the edge of his desk.

Some days Neal feels like the FBI will eat him alive. And then there are those moments when it really isn't so bad, when the anklet feels more like a gift than a deadweight. Moments when he counts the days until his release not because of the nagging, gnawing urge to run away, but because only when he's free can he fully embrace this life. Only when he's his own man, free and clear, can he kiss Peter in full view of everybody.

Because Peter does things like this. Peter brings him cupcakes when he's depressed, even when he hasn't said a word.

Neal looks up at the glass wall of Peter's office. Peter's head is bowed over his desk; he's already fully engrossed in some project or report.

Neal picks up the cupcake and waits until Peter's eyes flick upwards -- he knows that Peter _always_ looks, that Peter can't help looking, that Peter's days in that glass office are punctuated by regular glances down at Neal. And at that moment of contact, Neal flicks his tongue lightly across the cupcake's frosting, and smiles. He is gratified to see Peter's eyes widen, even more gratified by the way that Peter's startled pleasure flickers rapidly through annoyance and back to pleasure again.

Neal sets the cupcake back on the edge of his desk, grinning, wrapped in a warm glow.

Maybe he'll keep it for a while.

**Author's Note:**

> A quick request: I've gotten a few comments on my fics lately that are, basically, soapboxing about the reader's dislike of Peter, how badly he mistreats Neal, or other things of that nature. Please don't do this. There's a time and a place to have a critical discussion of Peter and Neal's relationship; the comments of my fic are not that place. I'm going to start deleting those unacknowledged, even if the comment is otherwise flattering. (I've dithered on saying something, because the vast majority of the comments I get are very sweet and lovely, and even the ones that bother me are, I know, well-meant. But those sorts of comments make me very unhappy, and I'd rather not receive them. And this strikes me as exactly the sort of fic that might attract those comments, so ... please don't.)


End file.
